THOUGH JUST A DAY PAST ITS SELL-BY, IT DOES SMELL A BIT IFFY.

STADIUM CHEESE AND ONION PASTY

This pasty was anthemic. This pasty was epic. This triplet is fraudulent.

Selhurst Park Stadium, home of Crystal Palace FC, had inevitably run out of meat-based pastry snacks by the time I arrived at the counter, late in the half-time period of Palace v Leeds United (FT: 2-2), so the vegetarian option it was.

The pastry was a decent thickness and only several bits of crumb fell to the floor or on my jacket sleeve while consuming off a makeshift plate (napkin). The sauce mix was temperate, which can be commended in a field where sauces can be a tongue-scarringly brutal surprise within an unassuming casing. The taste edged more towards Walker’s cheese and onion than its natural cousins.

There were no elaborate solos from unidentified food products within this sauce mix – another bonus. You have to seize on small victories in the world of stadium snacking.

To suggest I was living on a prayer by eating this baked snack would be overly harsh judgement on the environmental health standards of the Selhurst Park kitchens and kitchen staff, but in terms of overall satisfaction, it didn’t take me more than halfway there.